Testing TerraPass on the shelf at Sam’s Club
Tom Arnold | January 22, 2007
This morning we announced a partnership with retailer Sam’s Club and Kärcher, a manufacturer of pressure washers and other innovative cleaning products. The partnership is the first time carbon offsets like TerraPass will be bundled with a retail product in US stores.
In 2007, any Kärcher G 3025 BH model pressure washer bought at Sam’s Club will come with 285 lbs of CO2 reductions. A pressure washer, for those who have never had the pleasure of using one, is like a hose on steroids. The device takes in water and shoots it out at high pressure. Pressure washers are used in a range of cleaning projects, from lawn furniture to national monuments.
Pressure washers are an environmentally friendly product, because they use a lot less water than standard hoses. They are also crucial for energy-saving projects such as cleaning heat pump coils.
But pressure washers run on gasoline and emit carbon dioxide. The result of the partnership between Kärcher, Sam’s Club, and TerraPass is a carbon-neutral pressure washer that comes with enough offsets to balance out two years of typical usage.
We’re excited about this for a few reasons.
- The product carries a potent and targeted conservation message. Kärcher knows their customer, the weekend home improvement warrior. TerraPass knows a great deal about simple ways to save energy around the house. Together we came up with a fun booklet that contains ten energy-saving home improvement tips. If just a fraction of customers implement these tips, they can easily reduce thousands of pounds of CO2.
- Sam’s Club has 47 million members, a huge audience to educate and engage on the subject of climate change. Many people take issue with the business practices at Wal-Mart, Sam’s parent company. But where some see only problems, we see a huge opportunity for progress.
- Green continues to go mainstream. We’ve long believed that if we are going to have a big impact, we have to reach new audiences. Your typical Sam’s club member does not belong to the Sierra Club or read The New York Times.
- We think carbon offsets are a good business decision for brand managers. If your product is a cause of climate change, you have to speak to you customers about their concerns. Help them measure their emissions. Help them understand their impact. And give them the ability to reduce that impact. The Kärcher deal may be a little ahead of its time, but it’s smart, and we’ll learn a lot.
- This program is good for customers. It offers a cool product experience. With the pressure washer, you get a thermometer, a fun project booklet and the peace of mind that whatever CO2 you emit while using Honda’s newest low-emission engine gets balanced with clean American energy.
One final fun thing about the project comes to mind. The internal code name for the Kärcher pressure washer was “Hummer” due to its boxy look and yellow body. The 2006 packaging pictured, naturally, a Hummer being cleaned. At our request, the 2007 packaging features a Prius instead. Every little bit helps…
Bringing new meaning to the term "GREENWASHING"
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That is great. How about a deal like that with a Gas company? Tack carbon offsets to each gallon of gas.
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Isn't it better to buy the TerraPass and wash the car with a bucket and a low-flow nozzle? I really hope we can get past the "bundling" concept so that people don't think that by buying stuff they are reducing emissions. It's encouraging that more people would be made carbon-aware by seeing it on their big-box store shelf, but buying a TerraPass doesn't REDUCE emissions. We still have to do that too...
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Depends on where you are really and what you are doing.
The water savings are 80% and you can feed this model pressure from a rain water tank. It's very powerful, so you can accomplish the same job very quickly and with less soap (or no soap).
Secondly, there are some jobs where a pressure washer is a neccessity. Did you know you should clean the coils on your heat pump at least once a year? See the booklet for some other examples.
That all being said, Sue. You are right. If you don't need a pressure washer, don't buy one. If you do, think about a carbon-balanced one.
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Whatever the actual gains for alternativies by bundling like this, its a big step forward just to get people to think about the carbon impact of something as simple as making a consumer purchase. Ditto the carbon labeling in Britain. I find the biggest obstacle to making a dent in consumer impact on carbon debt is simply getting people to consider the things they do and buy as a trail of effects on their environment.
If you can nudge a critical mass of people to become aware of the environmental impact of their purchases from the raw materials stage all the way through to ultimage disposal, that alone would be huge. There's enormous power for good in an informed consumer base.
All too often I find I have conversations with people who mean well but who are only thinking of part of the chain, like one lady who recently told me she buys organic because its better for you. I told her I thought it could be, in some instances, better for you, but I buy organic because it preserves and even improves the soil and poses no toxic health risks for the people who work the fields or who live near said fields. She was speechless; she just hadn't yet taken her thought all the way to the start of actual production, despite her willingness to go out of her way and even pay more to support a good ethic. And why should she, when so few people ever have to deal with actual production of food or anything else? In this country most of us have to go out of our way to learn how food or anything else is made; we don't create our neccessities in the village for all to see.
So yes, by all means, label and bundle. People who already bother to inform themselves about these things don't need it, but there are simply too few to make the needed difference in our sustainability. Let's reel in the masses. I'm old enough to have seen it work with things like anti-littering and the bottle return law pioneered in Oregon. No one thought that would work except the people in state government who'd studied it in foreign countries and the tiny minority of "crazy" environmentalists. But it worked - and continues to work - wonderfully. It even created jobs. And the average person has gone from thinking of recycling glass as a pain to doing it automatically without a second thought. Its just a matter of what people understand, get used to, and demand as a better alternative.
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I am disappointed that you have chosen Sams Club, of WalMart fame, to partner with.
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